Open Bar #95 - Rings Of Power Demolished, Doctor Who Disaster, Fleabag Takes On Tomb Raider 

The funniest part of the whole stream was the Drinker thinking the US Federal debt was $ 10 trillion. It's over $34 trillion. 😅

"Do you know why a rock sinks and a boat floats? Because the rock looks downward." "But rocks don't have faces. You can't tell which way a rock is looking. You're not making sense." "Do you know why a little girl gets her head slapped?"

Hearing about Amazon owning part of IMDB explains why ROP has a 7/10 rating. Real believable, that rating.

In his now infamous quote, Russell T Davies said, quote "Time and society and culture and taste has moved on, and there's a problem with the Davros of old in that he's a wheelchair user who's evil. And I had problems with that, and a lot of us on the production team had problems with that, of associating disability with evil, and trust me, there's a very long tradition of this." After which he proceeded to remove one of the disabled communities best villains in the name of representation. Hilarious. Now, applying his own logic to his own work we have the Maestro, a trans non-binary character. Again, applying his own logic, that is, we cannot represent a villain as being disabled because people will then associate disability with evil, it stands to reason that Russell must not only be happy to represent trans and non-binary people as evil, but actively encourages it by omission of other groups on the grounds that he doesn't want to represent them that way. It's the truly perfect example of letting your morals and beliefs be dictated by what you think others think is right rather than what you think is right. Any group should be able to be represented as both villains and heroes. By "sparing" the disabled community the "indignity" of awesome villain characters he's necessarily said that identifying trans and non-binary with evil is perfectly acceptable. Great job Russell, gotta love that cognitive dissonance for all to see.

I never knew Ian McKellen was gay until this podcast Goes to show u how lil a thing matters compared to how great of a person someone is as well as, in the case of acting, how amazing they r at portraying a character other than themselves Same goes for Kevin Conroy Never knew he was gay until a month after his unfortunate passing Absolute legends the both of em

Without respect, it's nothing more than fan fiction and should be treated as such. Have we ever let bad fan fiction kill the originals for us? We should ignore it

I have friends who are into the MESSAGE! I describe what is happening in our nerd space. The answer I always get is “why do you care” and I always say, if your ideology has to destroy culture and not make anything new and regress us all to being only about race and sexuality. What does that say about your ideology.

A gay actor played Barney Stinson on How I Met Your Mother. Remind me who gave a shit about that again... Other than loving it because NPH is a good actor.

All i cloud think about when i saw that "why do boats float"-scene in the show, was the Breaking Bad meme "yeah, science!"" 🤣

"Rocks are sinky" just cracked me up 😂😂

Californication was about a guy, Hank Moody, who sleeps around constantly with women, but it was only the surface of the character, and it is made clear that it is part of his self-destructive behaviour. His behaviour is not portrayed as something positive that people should replicate; Hank is miserable and heartbroken. He is acting out in a childish manner, he screwed up his family and he hates himself for it. The show appears as decadent, but in actuality it has a conservative message.

Speaking of Wheel of Time, I've been reading through the books recently. One of those series I consider a timeless fantasy epic and what did Amazon do with it? Hand it to a talentless DEI hire with zero respect for the original source material that they are adapting.

Drinker, I can see what you’re trying to say about Ncuti Gatwa and casting a “cool, young” actor, or trying to make him “current,“ but I’d argue both David Tennant and Matt Smith were both cool and young/hip types of doctors. The difference is, their sexuality and gender wasn’t all that they were. You weren’t constantly reminded how they were straight and male like as if that was a personality trait. They had depth, gravitas, personality, and the emotional range. More importantly, while they were consistent in many ways, they were also quite different due to their experiences and the time in which they took place. Not to mention, the stories that they were involved in weren’t some thinly veiled commentary on the current day politics. There was certainly hints of that sprinkled around, and there were always bits of progressive ideas sprinkled in as well, but they were more like afterthoughts or accents rather than the main attraction.

@1:46:30 Agree with Shad. Over the past, what... 10+ years or so?? especially in a work/public setting, it was frowned upon or thought of as being non-inclusive to say "Merry Christmas". Instead, people were encouraged to say "Happy Holidays".

1:43:00 - When a straight person is shown to be purely sexuality-focused (the be-all, end-all of their character), it's usually either done in mockery of that character, and/or the show is a comedy.

Ncuti Gatwa seems to me just another influencer/streamer that could be doing make up tutorials, try on hauls and "trendy" dances everyone else is doing.

Okay, on Drinker's point about Phoebie-whatsherbucket: Think of her as the "Silver Surfer" from the MCU. Yes, the Silver Surfer doesn't destroy worlds himself, but if you see him visiting a planet, you're going to avoid vacationing to that planet for the next little bit due to the knowledge that Galactus is going to eat that planet soon. As the panel pointed out, Hollywood had a perception of her as "next-big-shot-geek-and-feminist-writer/producer". Even if she didn't DIRECTLY contribute to that, she serves as a sign that the higher ups are going to prioritize DEI stuff in the plot and production, so actually... yeah, it IS deserved, just not because of her direct actions.

My favorite take on mitril: "It's a metal with a silvery shine, veins of it are extremely rare and it's much harder to work with than iron, but when handled by a sufficiently skilled craftsman it's both lighter and stronger than steel. ...Hang on a second. We have that in real life! It's not a magical super-metal, it's aluminium!"

“It is a barren wasteland, riddled with wigs and ash and dust, the very wigs you wear are a poisonous fume. Not with ten thousand wigs could you do this. It is folly.”

"Rocks are sinky" That's higher caliber writing than anything the RoP writers came up with. I'm 100% serious. It's funny, it was intended to be funny, and it accurately mocks its target.

Doctor Fleabag: Tomb of the Rings

At least we now have confirmation that the Doctor's specialty is proctology. 🙃

24:15 “Marty, you're not thinking intersectionally!”

the fact that an actor happens to be be gay is such a deflection by the show creators. Sir Ian Mckellan is gay as a 3 dollar bill and I'd watch his performance as the Doctor in a heartbeat. Its that the Doctor isn't gay and Gatwa fails to impart any of the Doctor's qualities into his interpretation of the role.. He's a bad Doctor

The boats are floaty floaty, the stones are sinky silky...

Someone on the Rings of Power S2 trailer comments quoted the prank on Elija Wood by Dom Monaghan on LOTR bonus features saying “When will you wear wigs?” and that killed me.

I skipped this weeks FNT because of the guest but hey, here's another FNT for this week, with much less screaming!

Russel T. Davis deliberately destroying the franchise just out of spite. He's a bitter old man who just needs to have his work be ignored.

I didn't knew about Clarkson's farm until you guys talked about it , I started watching it and I love it thanks for recommending it

In regards to Clarkson's Farm. The "new farming" is standard stuff. My girlfriend is getting a PHD on plant science, she specifically works with animal feed and tests mixed crops with grass. All the soil testing and using crops like peas to get nitrogen into the soil (nitrogen fixing) is common practice in most places. My guess is that Charlie usually has that done behind the scenes and this was thier way of incorporating it into the show.

Vin Desiel's best role was Saving Private Ryan because he didn't survive past the first 20 minutes

1995. . . You named about eight great movies. Now they can't put out one!

Hard to say what Fleabag will do with Tomb Raider, but I have no faith in it considering how poorly the series and character of Lara Croft has been handled in the past decade.

Speaking for myself , I am glad for all the memes and jokes this show gave me. The phrase " The sea is always right " is pure gold . It never fails to lighten up my mood.

I think Davies went super gay from grief when his husband died.

Dr who moralizing is technically on point for the franchise, it was built from the ground up for moralizing just like star Trek was. The only real problem is that it's been hijacked to push bad morality and the writers aren't nearly skilled enough to hide that.

Next to Bloodshot and Groot. Vin Diesel was also the Iron Giant

Hey, nobody told me Joy Behar was going to be on Doctor Who. I mean, nurse what. 😅

Clarksons Farm is so perfect. Really wholesome tv

Great Guests this week, this is the gold standard of youtubers at the moment. Bout time we had despot on FNT

I sometimes get the feeling that some companies deliberately sabotage their physical releases. Lucifer. DVD but no BluRay. So you only get HD on Streaming. Game of Thrones. Dothraki are not subtitled on the DVD unless you turn on the closed captions. Disney released Kim Possible Season 1 and 2 on DVD. But no 3 or 4. Sailor Moon HD Remaster. HD only Japanese Dub. German Dub is a separate video in the old SD quality. Whatever the hell that Buffy BluRay was.

They should have got that guy who played Nordberg in the Naked Gun movies to play O.J.

I still have Command and Conquer on my computer. I absolutely love that game. It’s definitely the game that got me interested in gaming.

Hey Drinker, I really enjoy these discussions and have been a fan of yours for awhile. Do you ever think of making these available on Spotify as a podcast format?

My older brother still defends this show and wants me to give it a chance. It’s bewildering

FYI, James Garner played the original Bret Maverick on the 1950s TV version, hence his role in the film adaptation.

Indiana jones dial of whatever Last James Bond movie , Tomb raider last movie … Don’t know I thank this whole panel for taking the bullet for me watching these horrible movies You gentlemen have faught hard and I’ve always agreed mostly with your opinions on films and tv shows Thank you gentlemen again You deserve a parade

Great guests and great conversation this week. Good stuff!

The Fall Guy is my favourite videogame adaptation. It's about the partygame where the goobers of all colors of the rainbow compete on the obstacle course right?

The 90's where awesome! 😎

In 1995 I was the first year in Moçambique, working in a district hospital. We together with a mennonite missionary made it to have the first Email in The district of Inhambane. Pegasus email. We had to phone the capital with our modem. There was no phone in the whole district and still no cellphone. So our house was allways full of people wanting to Email home on my 500 mb PC on windows 95.

Absolutely fantastic panel, really enjoyed this 👏 🍻

Drinker you’re a legend !!!

I petition we change the name of Doctor Who to save the memory of what it used to be. From now on, I'm only going to refer to it as "Nurse Why" or "Nurse What."

Best open bar I’ve seen in a long time. Thanks gents.

Wheel of Time was and is a waste of time. Dude put out something like 20 or 30 300-400 page books that went nowhere slowly. Each book was the size of a dictionary filled with nothing. I got about 7-10 books in before I got completely disgusted and dropped the series. I like the premise, I liked SOME of the characters, but the writer completely milked it, having whole books that went on a complete ramble about things that didn’t even pertain to the story

Ace Ventura 2 was funny. I still laugh when thinking about the rhino scene.

“And some things that should not have been forgotten were lost. History became legend. Legend became myth. And for two and a half thousand years, the wig passed out of all knowledge.”

Sauron learned how to disguise himself from Team Rocket

Russel Trans Davies should just use the quote from Hot Fuzz on his destroying Doctor Who. " I brought you into this world i think it's rather fitting that I should be the one to take you out of it ".

I don’t know Pertwee was pretty cool as the doctor. Someone mentioned that Chiwetel Ejiofor would be a perfect casting for the doctor, and I totally agree. He has the gravitas, cleverness and conviction needed for the role. PS, Streetfighter with Van Damme was a silly fun video game adaptation.

Referring the Doctor Who discussion. Sometimes it feels like the vast majority of great TV series and movies are it just by coincidence. Several film directors come to mind who have come to "save" IP after decades of being away.. and effing it up even more.

I just bought Animal Farm and Huckleberry Finn. I've already read them, but i want to preserve them when the extreme right and the extreme left ban them respectively.

2:24:06 // Ryan “Dog” Kennel ladies and gentlemen. I would’ve George Costanza’d out of there on that high note.

Calling it. The two not-halflings, the adventurous one and the tagalong, will become the blue wizards.

I wish this show was longer. One of the best guests I've seen and very nice episode.

Awesome. I finally get to watch this show since I could not find it at all on Thursday.

Hold on, but Celeborn is the father of Celebran who marries Elrond and is the mother of Arwen. If we don’t get Celeborn we don’t get Arwen

Dr.who vs the head witch in Hocus Pocus

Maybe the Barrow-wights were spirits of ancient Edain from the First Age. It might be a bit early for Haradrim, but Easterlings were very active in helping both elves and Morgoth since at least 455 F.A.

the best movie vin diesel has been in is still the iron giant. as far as im aware, advent children isn't strictly an adaptation, its a straight up sequel/epilogue. hotd vs rop is basically the mountain vs farmer maggot.

I honestly start to think that Mauler is gaslightning people with unbridled Arcane praise. Man, it had some good things going, but it also has huge world building flaws, some abysmal character interaction (or better say lack of it), several confusig direction choices an so on. Stop it, or you'll wake my own inner long man. And it won't be nice thing to behold. Because i'm not only long. I am also big. And rude. And srsly, wtf.

Love that intro.

38:35 Mad props to Critical Drinker on the 'Quantum Leap' reference. I wonder what percentage of viewers truly understood that?

Whenever they do the Belisarius "Do it. Kill her" quote I'm always reminded of Christopher Walken.

I know someone that worked on the creature designs etc for this and feel bad for them that all their effort is going into Rings of Power of all things.

Yeah... fans of genre totally hate gay actors... I mean, I remember the great divide when all the Star Trek fans suddenly refused to like TOS when we found out Tekai was gay, or the great nerd upheaval of the 2000 when fans refused to go watch Lord of the Rings because Sir Ian McKellan was gay. The great schism over Modern family when every refused to watch it because Jesse Tyler Ferguson. Or the outrage at NPH being cast in Starship Troopers and How I MEt Your Mother.... Oh wait... none of that happened and all those things are beloved by audiences across the board of genre geek and normie alike. Turns out Shootie Gaywhat and Russel T Davies just suck.

Boats float, rocks sink, sand gets everywhere and there’s always a bigger fish.

Street fighter 2 the animated movie for me as best video game adaptation. Only recently found out Brian Cranston voiced Fei Long 😂

Despot AND Gary?!?!?!!!?? My cup runneth over!

So funny. I literally shared the BBC Maestro scene from Who, and Facebook denied my post stating the video content goes against their Community Standards

1:26:10 claiming things "aren't made for straight white men" is an outright lie. These films/series were made in America/Britain for (primarily) American/British viewers, and to a further extent the Western hemisphere. And as much as it pains leftists to admit, and they're doing everything in their power possible to change that now, the demographics of the Anglosphere are slanted to hetero Caucasians. So (until recently) they absolutely 100% were targeted towards straight white men and/or women. Now that isn't to say no other nationality or cultured person couldn't watch and enjoy them - provided their morality belief system is inline with our own, and cultural relativism has proved that isn't a given fact - because it was never exclusively white only entertainment, but they used to want to make a profit, and to do that they made it for their audience, which means it was most definitely white centred.

Drinker, please review Dragonslayer (Disney, 1981). It shows where Disney's head has been at for a long time, yet at the same time is also one of the greatest Fantasy genre movies ever filmed.

The mystery boxes for season two of rings of power are going to be balrogs, ents, the haradrim and the blue wizards

This was a great conversation you guys had. Everyone on this panel is awesome👍

how exactly did a demographic so small as to be statistically insignificant functionally take over all of modern media?

I really just have to say that the theme song for Open Bar is bleeping brilliant, whoever did it is awesome. This is not a subjective opinion.

I like Timothy Olyphant, he is great in Deadwood and Justified.

Gary nails this one. Phoebe is the kiss of death. Not that she is terrible, but the forces that put her IN are the same ones that ruin everything.

Good panel for this one.

Tolerance should be good enough cause that's the best their ever gonna get.

As one of the alphabet people, all these smug unworthy "creatives" trying to coopt hobbies in the name of their dogmatic slacktivism need to...unburden themselves from material corporealism.

Need a time machine to go back and show Tolkien ROP so in his last will he can write that Jeff Bezos is forbidden to ever adapt his works.😂😂😂

Technically, there is/are storyline in Twisted Metal, but it's more about Calypso playing Evil Genie; twisting the wish(es) of the winning driver (a la The Monkey's Paw). So there is something you could stitch together, but only with about as much coherence as Mortal Kombat has (given how many times its characters suffer fatalities)

PWB should be a Coronation Street actor and thats about it

Thought: "What would a *_Gangs of London_* review by the Drinker be like 🤔?

I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out Russel T Davis had spent the last 5 years in an cult compound, like the UHC in "The Running Grave."

I think Gary should bring in his wife for that episode of either FNT or Nerdrotic live. Just to cover rings of power wigs

Just saw Ryan on saucy Saturday, everybody was talking about danika

The world needs more fly kicks